Six more measles cases reported in California after Disneyland outbreak

LOS ANGELES Jan 26 (Reuters) - Six more cases of measles
have been confirmed in California following an outbreak at
Disneyland that began in December, public health officials said
on Monday, raising to 74 the total number of people in the state
who have been infected.

Previously, 68 people in California had been confirmed to
have the measles, along with 14 others elsewhere: five in
Arizona, three in Utah, two in Washington state, one each in
Oregon, Colorado and Nevada, and one in Mexico.

The latest tally includes 73 cases documented by the
California Department of Public Health and one additional
patient reported by the Ventura County Health Care Agency.

Most, but not all, of the 88 known cases of measles in
California and out of state have been linked to an outbreak that
is believed to have begun when an infected person, likely from
out of the country, visited the Disneyland resort in Anaheim
between Dec. 15 and Dec. 20.

Among those infected are at least five Disney employees and
a student from a local high school that has ordered its
unvaccinated students to stay home until Thursday.

Four patients are less than a year old and 11 others are
between the ages of 1 and 4.

The outbreak has renewed debate over the so-called
anti-vaccination movement in which fears about potential side
effects of vaccines, fueled by now-debunked theories suggesting
a link to autism, have led a small minority of parents to refuse
to allow their children to be inoculated.

The California health department has said that unvaccinated
individuals have been a factor in the outbreak, although some of
the infected patients had been inoculated.
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